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The graphic warnings are intended to deter smoking. They include short statements and “photo-realistic color images depicting some of the lesser-known health risks of cigarette smoking.” The depicted health risks include bladder cancer, prominent neck tumors, limb amputation, erectile dysfunction, type II diabetes, blindness, and heart and lung disease. The warnings would replace the standard Surgeon General’s warning, which the agency described as “virtually invisible” to consumers.

Cigarette smoking can harm children..

stunt fetal growth...

cause blindness...

cause bladder cancer...

lead to limb amputation...

cause more blindness...

cause COPD...

(another COPD warning)

cause heart disease and strokes...

cause head and neck cancers...

cause type II diabetes...

cause lung disease...

and cause ED.

The FDA said the new warnings fulfill a mandate set by a 2009 law called The Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act (TCA). The act required the agency to come up with fresh warnings for cigarette packages and ads to address the lingering public health issue.

To this day, cigarette smoking remains the leading cause of preventable disease and death in the US, the agency notes. Smoking is linked to 480,000 deaths per year, which is more than those linked to HIV, illegal drug use, alcohol use, motor vehicle injuries, and firearm-related incidents combined. Smoking-related diseases afflict more than 16 million Americans in total.

Enlarge/ An example of what the warnings would look like on a packet of cigarettes.

The agency tried to fulfill the TCA’s mandate back in 2011, rolling out nine warnings and similarly graphic images. But several tobacco companies challenged the warnings in court, arguing that they were scare tactics and that they violated the First Amendment. The tobacco companies won the case and, in 2013, the FDA officially scrapped its plan and headed back to its Stephen King-inspired drawing board.

Though the latest round of warnings are equally disturbing, the agency appeared more confident they could withstand legal challenges, noting that they’re backed by research and based on facts.

“FDA undertook a comprehensive, science-based research and development process to get these proposed warnings right by developing distinct and clear messages about the risks associated with cigarette smoking and exposure to secondhand smoke,” Mitch Zeller, J.D., director of the FDA’s Center for Tobacco Products, said in a statement.

Tobacco companies are now mulling the new rules. In an emailed statement to NPR, Kaelan Hollon, a spokesperson for Reynolds American Inc. (parent company of R.J. Reynolds) wrote:

We firmly support public awareness of the harms of smoking cigarettes, but the manner in which those messages are delivered to the public cannot run afoul of the First Amendment protections that apply to all speakers, including cigarette manufacturers… [It] is important for FDA to focus on providing information that can produce health benefits for the public, not merely reiterating well-known messages that smoking is dangerous, which the public already understands.

Public comments are open on the proposed warnings until October 15. If they survive, the earliest they might appear on packages and ads is 2021.

This will change because a bunch of countries have legalized recreational marijuana, which also legalizes research into it.

Some countries that haven't legalized have done government-funded research into it because they -- get this -- wanted to actually know what the effects, positive and negative, would be in order to inform policies using facts.

I read (okay, skimmed) a study in the 90s from, I think, Canada on marijuana and lung cancer which found no link, once you controlled for tobacco usage. Don't think that was the last word on it but it shouldn't be that hard to find an association if it was as strong as with tobacco.

But if no one smokes how will we fund all the projects that are currently funded by the cigarette taxes?

With the money saved on health care, obviously.

But that isn't supported by economic analysis of the costs of smoking. Smokers cost a bit more per year but they don't live as long so there's a small net saving.

Increasing life expectancy is great for people, but very bad for government finances and healthcare systems.

I don't smoke and I wish other people wouldn't either, but the arguments for reducing smoking should be based on improvements to personal health and the health of those around you rather than using baseless economic claims. Also, do you really want us basing health policy on how much people cost? Down that road is a very dangerous place.

Put these on one side of the pack and then on the other put a similar warning taking the fiscal angle. For example a picture of a Playstation 4 Pro and in big block letters, "The amount you'll spend at a rate of a pack a week for a year can get you a PS4 Pro with games and extra controllers."

That's just an example using ~$9 or so a pack. You could jimmy the numbers to cover all sorts of different timescales and products.

"Smoking a pack a week for 5 years is a down payment on that Camaro you know you want"

Who smokes a pack a week? I'd venture to guess most addicts use between a half pack and a pack a day.

Pffft. When I quit I was doing three packs a day. And even that was still slowly increasing.

But, yes, very small amounts probably don't indicate addiction. I know a few people who have a cigarette maybe a couple times a year or so, and it's hard to criticize that level of use as long as they don't get it around me.

after seeing what 50+ years of smoking did to my dad, I will forever feel fortunate I never took it up.

Agreed! My Mom died from COPD complications 20 years ago. My Dad is still around. He only smoked for a couple of years in the 50's, and quit when he got out of the Marines and went to college. He found out he could eat for less at McDonalds than what his smokes cost, so he quit. True story!

Why not just let people smoke if they want to? Tax appropriately to cover health care costs, if your country has socialized medicine.

First, that's been tried. And, actually, it works. Raising taxes on cigarettes definitely causes people to quit, at least to some degree. Or at least it acts as a bonus incentive to quit, even if actually quitting comes about for some other reason.

Second, pretty much everyone - including the US - has some form of "socialized" medicine, if you count private insurance in that pile because it's still a collective solution, even though it's for-profit.

And finally, I don't really care if other people smoke, as long as they're not connected to me in any way, and as long as they don't do it around me.

after seeing what 50+ years of smoking did to my dad, I will forever feel fortunate I never took it up.

Agreed! My Mom died from COPD complications 20 years ago. My Dad is still around. He only smoked for a couple of years in the 50's, and quit when he got out of the Marines and went to college. He found out he could eat for less at McDonalds than what his smokes cost, so he quit. True story!

My aunt quit while my uncle still smoked. She squirreled away each week what she would spend in a week on smokes and after a year, she took the $5000+ ( smokes were much cheaper then) and took an awesome vacation in Florida for two weeks and left him the hell home. He quit soon after and now they take a vacation every year for two weeks to somewhere in the US.

They use stuff like that around here and they hike cigarettes prices three times a year by rising the taxes Tobacco companies have to pay, people still buy them anyway.

Obviously they are not hiking them enough. Would be ineresting how many people would buy cigerrettes when they are $50 a pack.

I'd guess not a huge lot less than now. Although one thing that would do would incentivize a black market.

See above; we've probably driven smoking down to to near as low a level as we'll reasonably be able to. We might eke out a very few more percentage points drop, but it'll come at increasing cost and effort.

after seeing what 50+ years of smoking did to my dad, I will forever feel fortunate I never took it up.

Agreed! My Mom died from COPD complications 20 years ago. My Dad is still around. He only smoked for a couple of years in the 50's, and quit when he got out of the Marines and went to college. He found out he could eat for less at McDonalds than what his smokes cost, so he quit. True story!

and the foodies that condemn McD's food will chafe at your dads behavior!

(likewise, i made the dangerous pathway of life without helping support all those poor, hardworking tabaccy farmers in the carolinas and other whoopass states!)

Why not just let people smoke if they want to? Tax appropriately to cover health care costs, if your country has socialized medicine.

It’s not so much the cost as it’s the resources being used. In Canada, for instance, the wait times for care is horrendous. If we could eliminate perfectly preventable health issues like those caused by smoking, our system would be vastly improved without costing more.

Hi. UK here. We already have this and have done for a good few years. Also tobacco products are not allowed to be on visible display in shops. There's an actual screen or sliding door between the customer and the product. You have to know what you want. You can't ask to look. Tobacco advertising is completely banned.

Slowly smoking rates are reducing but I haven't seen stats to suggest whether that's because less young are taking up the habit or many older folks are giving up.

I see a LOT of people vaping these days and, well, it's better than smoke.

I stopped a while back (unless I'm very drunk... that's the worst) but despite all the warnings the missus hasn't.

If I'm honest I think the biggest factor in the reduction of smoking in the UK is the insane price - all due to taxation.

(edit... typo. s'all)

Vaping is marginally better. Sure, there's less actual smoke, but we're starting to see bad lung reactions to the flavors used with them.

Canada has been using images like these on cigarette packs for just under 20 years. The result has been that around 14.9% of people over 15 smoke, compared 17.2% in the U.S. The difference doesn't sound like very much, but it would represent thousands of additional deaths in the U.S., and hundred of millions in healthcare costs (even adjusting for Canada having a fraction of the population).

Obviously this was combined with restrictions in advertising and other public health measures, but it's likely that the graphic images had some effect.

From a personal perspective, as a kid I remember thinking nothing of other people smoking. Now as an adult it's weirdly jarring (and a little gross) to see another adult smoking.

The second and third paragraphs are important as you'd have to figure out the effect from the graphics after accounting for everything the Canadian government has done to try and eliminate smoking. And then you'd have to do the same adjustments in the US.

Per that, the average American and average Canadian smoke almost exactly the same amount of cigarettes. Using those figures and your percentages, I get that an American is about 15% more likely to be a smoker than a Canadian, but a Canadian smoker averages about 15% more cigarettes per day.

Put these on one side of the pack and then on the other put a similar warning taking the fiscal angle. For example a picture of a Playstation 4 Pro and in big block letters, "The amount you'll spend at a rate of a pack a week for a year can get you a PS4 Pro with games and extra controllers."

That's just an example using ~$9 or so a pack. You could jimmy the numbers to cover all sorts of different timescales and products.

"Smoking a pack a week for 5 years is a down payment on that Camaro you know you want"

Who smokes a pack a week? I'd venture to guess most addicts use between a half pack and a pack a day.

Pffft. When I quit I was doing three packs a day. And even that was still slowly increasing.

But, yes, very small amounts probably don't indicate addiction. I know a few people who have a cigarette maybe a couple times a year or so, and it's hard to criticize that level of use as long as they don't get it around me.

I know a lot of people who "smoke socially," for some definition of "social" that includes 3 minutes after they wake up and every time they go outside. "I'm a social smoker" is generally code for "I'm sufficiently intelligent to know very well I shouldn't smoke, but I got hooked, so I need a fig leaf."

But yeah, there's a very few people hwo have a snoke a couple times a year. Not sure why the hell they bother, but.

Is it? I don't doubt it, but the problem right now is that there just hasn't been any solid study of the effects of long-term marijuana use, due to it still being classified as a Schedule 1 drug, making research all but impossible.

It's quite possible that, mL against mL, it turns out to be just as bad. Or maybe has its own, unique problems. But right now, we just don't know.

People certainly tend not to smoke nearly as much pot as they do cigarettes, though, so exposure is pretty much certainly lower. So in terms of damage from particulate matter - and that can be very significant for smokers when it comes to things like COPD and emphysema - it's probably less harmful than cigarettes just because of much lower exposure.

But there's just a hell of a lot unknown at this point. A solid reason for removing its Schedule 1 status is to allow more research to take place to start exploring these unknowns, especially as legalization at the state level continues to proceed rapidly.

Your point about researching pot is one that hasn't been reiterated enough. Legalizing pot doesn't mean it's completely safe, yet so many potheads believe that they can now smoke it with reckless abandon. One of my biggest pet peeves is that many apartment buildings do not include pot in their 'no smoking' rules. Pot smoke spreads everywhere fast and the smell lingers for a long time. I seriously doubt that second-hand pot smoking is harmless.

As a pot smoker that's just people being ignorant, smoke is smoke when you aren't someone that partakes and it's just rude to do it around folks that aren't okay with it.

But if no one smokes how will we fund all the projects that are currently funded by the cigarette taxes?

With the money saved on health care, obviously.

But that isn't supported by economic analysis of the costs of smoking. Smokers cost a bit more per year but they don't live as long so there's a small net saving.

Increasing life expectancy is great for people, but very bad for government finances and healthcare systems.

I don't smoke and I wish other people wouldn't either, but the arguments for reducing smoking should be based on improvements to personal health and the health of those around you rather than using baseless economic claims. Also, do you really want us basing health policy on how much people cost? Down that road is a very dangerous place.

There may be a small net saving in healthcare, but in the grand scheme of things a net loss - many end-stage smokers could still be within wage-earner status, so there's the tax loss to consider.

And for some (looking at the "It's my life, I can do with it whatever I want" crowd), money may be the only reason that matters.

Hi. UK here. We already have this and have done for a good few years. Also tobacco products are not allowed to be on visible display in shops. There's an actual screen or sliding door between the customer and the product. You have to know what you want. You can't ask to look. Tobacco advertising is completely banned.

Slowly smoking rates are reducing but I haven't seen stats to suggest whether that's because less young are taking up the habit or many older folks are giving up.

I see a LOT of people vaping these days and, well, it's better than smoke.

I stopped a while back (unless I'm very drunk... that's the worst) but despite all the warnings the missus hasn't.

If I'm honest I think the biggest factor in the reduction of smoking in the UK is the insane price - all due to taxation.

(edit... typo. s'all)

Vaping is marginally better. Sure, there's less actual smoke, but we're starting to see bad lung reactions to the flavors used with them.

Smoking is #2 (annualized risk of death 1 in 100) Vaping #7 (annualized risk of death 1 in 10,000,000)

Dunno about you, but I wouldn't call 100,000-fold difference in risk "marginal".

Put these on one side of the pack and then on the other put a similar warning taking the fiscal angle. For example a picture of a Playstation 4 Pro and in big block letters, "The amount you'll spend at a rate of a pack a week for a year can get you a PS4 Pro with games and extra controllers."

That's just an example using ~$9 or so a pack. You could jimmy the numbers to cover all sorts of different timescales and products.

"Smoking a pack a week for 5 years is a down payment on that Camaro you know you want"

Who smokes a pack a week? I'd venture to guess most addicts use between a half pack and a pack a day.

Pffft. When I quit I was doing three packs a day. And even that was still slowly increasing.

But, yes, very small amounts probably don't indicate addiction. I know a few people who have a cigarette maybe a couple times a year or so, and it's hard to criticize that level of use as long as they don't get it around me.

I know a lot of people who "smoke socially," for some definition of "social" that includes 3 minutes after they wake up and every time they go outside. "I'm a social smoker" is generally code for "I'm sufficiently intelligent to know very well I shouldn't smoke, but I got hooked, so I need a fig leaf."

But yeah, there's a very few people hwo have a snoke a couple times a year. Not sure why the hell they bother, but.

So, I tried to quit several times before succeeding. Once, I made almost two whole days without a cigarette. Then caved.

The intense rush of pleasure that first puff elicited is why people bother. I mean, if I could enjoy that WITHOUT the addictive triggers that come along with it and lead to insatiably increasing want, I'd totally do one once in a while just for the buzz.

But I know what'll happen if I go there again. So, nope, not gonna do it.

Hi. UK here. We already have this and have done for a good few years. Also tobacco products are not allowed to be on visible display in shops. There's an actual screen or sliding door between the customer and the product. You have to know what you want. You can't ask to look. Tobacco advertising is completely banned.

Slowly smoking rates are reducing but I haven't seen stats to suggest whether that's because less young are taking up the habit or many older folks are giving up.

I see a LOT of people vaping these days and, well, it's better than smoke.

I stopped a while back (unless I'm very drunk... that's the worst) but despite all the warnings the missus hasn't.

If I'm honest I think the biggest factor in the reduction of smoking in the UK is the insane price - all due to taxation.

(edit... typo. s'all)

Vaping is marginally better. Sure, there's less actual smoke, but we're starting to see bad lung reactions to the flavors used with them.

Smoking is #2 (annualized risk of death 1 in 100) Vaping #7 (annualized risk of death 1 in 10,000,000)

Dunno about you, but I wouldn't call 100,000-fold difference in risk "marginal".

Again, this is something we don't really know much about yet. There just hasn't been a whole lot of research on health effects of vaping, and most of the ingredients used are essentially unknown, as the product is barely regulated in any meaningful way.

Smoking's health effects take many, many years to become apparent, even now that we know to look for them. I don't know why vaping would be any different in terms of how long it will take for any of its health effects to show up.

Put these on one side of the pack and then on the other put a similar warning taking the fiscal angle. For example a picture of a Playstation 4 Pro and in big block letters, "The amount you'll spend at a rate of a pack a week for a year can get you a PS4 Pro with games and extra controllers."

That's just an example using ~$9 or so a pack. You could jimmy the numbers to cover all sorts of different timescales and products.

"Smoking a pack a week for 5 years is a down payment on that Camaro you know you want"

Who smokes a pack a week? I'd venture to guess most addicts use between a half pack and a pack a day.

Pffft. When I quit I was doing three packs a day. And even that was still slowly increasing.

But, yes, very small amounts probably don't indicate addiction. I know a few people who have a cigarette maybe a couple times a year or so, and it's hard to criticize that level of use as long as they don't get it around me.

I know a lot of people who "smoke socially," for some definition of "social" that includes 3 minutes after they wake up and every time they go outside. "I'm a social smoker" is generally code for "I'm sufficiently intelligent to know very well I shouldn't smoke, but I got hooked, so I need a fig leaf."

But yeah, there's a very few people hwo have a snoke a couple times a year. Not sure why the hell they bother, but.

So, I tried to quit several times before succeeding. Once, I made almost two whole days without a cigarette. Then caved.

The intense rush of pleasure that first puff elicited is why people bother. I mean, if I could enjoy that WITHOUT the addictive triggers that come along with it and lead to insatiably increasing want, I'd totally do one once in a while just for the buzz.

But I know what'll happen if I go there again. So, nope, not gonna do it.

I mean having only partaken of tobacco a couple times and finding no psychoactive effects... Is it not possible that the pleasure response is one and the same as the addiction?

Edit: also re: the difficulty of quitting. Like my mother used to say (quoting a comedian I think): "quitting is easy -- I've done it a hundred times!"

Hi. UK here. We already have this and have done for a good few years. Also tobacco products are not allowed to be on visible display in shops. There's an actual screen or sliding door between the customer and the product. You have to know what you want. You can't ask to look. Tobacco advertising is completely banned.

Slowly smoking rates are reducing but I haven't seen stats to suggest whether that's because less young are taking up the habit or many older folks are giving up.

I see a LOT of people vaping these days and, well, it's better than smoke.

I stopped a while back (unless I'm very drunk... that's the worst) but despite all the warnings the missus hasn't.

If I'm honest I think the biggest factor in the reduction of smoking in the UK is the insane price - all due to taxation.

(edit... typo. s'all)

My dad gave up a few years back after smoking for over 50 years, partly because of that cost and partly because my partner died from a smoking-related illness. I wish the price had ramped-up faster and sooner. It is not an easy way to go.

Hi. UK here. We already have this and have done for a good few years. Also tobacco products are not allowed to be on visible display in shops. There's an actual screen or sliding door between the customer and the product. You have to know what you want. You can't ask to look. Tobacco advertising is completely banned.

Slowly smoking rates are reducing but I haven't seen stats to suggest whether that's because less young are taking up the habit or many older folks are giving up.

I see a LOT of people vaping these days and, well, it's better than smoke.

I stopped a while back (unless I'm very drunk... that's the worst) but despite all the warnings the missus hasn't.

If I'm honest I think the biggest factor in the reduction of smoking in the UK is the insane price - all due to taxation.

(edit... typo. s'all)

Vaping is marginally better. Sure, there's less actual smoke, but we're starting to see bad lung reactions to the flavors used with them.

Smoking is #2 (annualized risk of death 1 in 100) Vaping #7 (annualized risk of death 1 in 10,000,000)

Dunno about you, but I wouldn't call 100,000-fold difference in risk "marginal".

It may only be that because we don't have a 20-year history with vaping.

Juul, for example, is only 2 years old. How many lung cancer cases do we see with even a 4-year smoking history? Relatively few. But few deny that the link exists.

Put these on one side of the pack and then on the other put a similar warning taking the fiscal angle. For example a picture of a Playstation 4 Pro and in big block letters, "The amount you'll spend at a rate of a pack a week for a year can get you a PS4 Pro with games and extra controllers."

That's just an example using ~$9 or so a pack. You could jimmy the numbers to cover all sorts of different timescales and products.

"Smoking a pack a week for 5 years is a down payment on that Camaro you know you want"

Who smokes a pack a week? I'd venture to guess most addicts use between a half pack and a pack a day.

Using the US/Canada percentages someone posted in this thread and (2016) per capita numbers I found on wikipedia, I get an average of 16.2 cigarettes per day in the US (and 18.8 in Canada), so typical is just under one pack a day. So...

"Smoking a pack a week for 5 years is a down payment on that Camaro you know you want"Well, using those figures, it is $2340 which isn't even that great of a down payment (like 2-8% depending on which Camaro and options you want).

But, the average smoker, at ~80% of a pack per day, gets to $13,268 after five years -- probably can call it $14,000 figuring in lighters and can probably claim like $20,000 if you figure in any medical co-pays or medication costs that were a result of smoking over the five years. Now we're talking a pretty solid car down-payment

Put these on one side of the pack and then on the other put a similar warning taking the fiscal angle. For example a picture of a Playstation 4 Pro and in big block letters, "The amount you'll spend at a rate of a pack a week for a year can get you a PS4 Pro with games and extra controllers."

That's just an example using ~$9 or so a pack. You could jimmy the numbers to cover all sorts of different timescales and products.

"Smoking a pack a week for 5 years is a down payment on that Camaro you know you want"

Who smokes a pack a week? I'd venture to guess most addicts use between a half pack and a pack a day.

Pffft. When I quit I was doing three packs a day. And even that was still slowly increasing.

But, yes, very small amounts probably don't indicate addiction. I know a few people who have a cigarette maybe a couple times a year or so, and it's hard to criticize that level of use as long as they don't get it around me.

I know a lot of people who "smoke socially," for some definition of "social" that includes 3 minutes after they wake up and every time they go outside. "I'm a social smoker" is generally code for "I'm sufficiently intelligent to know very well I shouldn't smoke, but I got hooked, so I need a fig leaf."

But yeah, there's a very few people hwo have a snoke a couple times a year. Not sure why the hell they bother, but.

So, I tried to quit several times before succeeding. Once, I made almost two whole days without a cigarette. Then caved.

The intense rush of pleasure that first puff elicited is why people bother. I mean, if I could enjoy that WITHOUT the addictive triggers that come along with it and lead to insatiably increasing want, I'd totally do one once in a while just for the buzz.

But I know what'll happen if I go there again. So, nope, not gonna do it.

I mean having only partaken of tobacco a couple times and finding no psychoactive effects... Is it not possible that the pleasure response is one and the same as the addiction?

I put the '+' there because one thing I noticed was that, while quitting cigarettes was one of the hardest things I've ever done, I finally managed with a combination of nicotine patches and gum, then just gum, and when I trepidatiously gave up the gum, kicking just the pure nicotine didn't cause so much as a twitch; it was WAY easier. So I'm in the camp that thinks cigarette companies were definitely goosing their product to enhance its addictiveness.

But if no one smokes how will we fund all the projects that are currently funded by the cigarette taxes?

With the money saved on health care, obviously.

But that isn't supported by economic analysis of the costs of smoking. Smokers cost a bit more per year but they don't live as long so there's a small net saving.

Increasing life expectancy is great for people, but very bad for government finances and healthcare systems.

I don't smoke and I wish other people wouldn't either, but the arguments for reducing smoking should be based on improvements to personal health and the health of those around you rather than using baseless economic claims. Also, do you really want us basing health policy on how much people cost? Down that road is a very dangerous place.

There may be a small net saving in healthcare, but in the grand scheme of things a net loss - many end-stage smokers could still be within wage-earner status, so there's the tax loss to consider.

And for some (looking at the "It's my life, I can do with it whatever I want" crowd), money may be the only reason that matters.

In the main, people who are dying from smoking are past working age and are no longer net contributors to the public finances. People have studied these economic effects in detail and as I mentioned in another post, a Finnish analysis found that every smoker saved the state an average of €133,800 mainly because they weren't around to claim pensions, welfare payments, and other support that's on offer to older people. If you're concerned with saving money then we should be promoting smoking, especially among poorer demographics who are less likely to be net contributors to the public purse to begin with. Personally I'd rather we didn't go down that road because I don't want health decisions being driven by economics and the end result of that thinking is terrible things like Aktion T4.

I do agree though that on an individual level, the fact that giving up their habit saves a smoker a lot of money can be a really good way to get them to quit. Show them how much they're spending and what else they could be doing with the money such as enjoying an extra family holiday every year.

Canada has been using images like these on cigarette packs for just under 20 years. The result has been that around 14.9% of people over 15 smoke, compared 17.2% in the U.S. The difference doesn't sound like very much, but it would represent thousands of additional deaths in the U.S., and hundred of millions in healthcare costs (even adjusting for Canada having a fraction of the population).

Obviously this was combined with restrictions in advertising and other public health measures, but it's likely that the graphic images had some effect.

From a personal perspective, as a kid I remember thinking nothing of other people smoking. Now as an adult it's weirdly jarring (and a little gross) to see another adult smoking.

The second and third paragraphs are important as you'd have to figure out the effect from the graphics after accounting for everything the Canadian government has done to try and eliminate smoking. And then you'd have to do the same adjustments in the US.

Per that, the average American and average Canadian smoke almost exactly the same amount of cigarettes. Using those figures and your percentages, I get that an American is about 15% more likely to be a smoker than a Canadian, but a Canadian smoker averages about 15% more cigarettes per day.

Do they cancel out? No clue.

That lines up with an earlier poster's citation that graphics reduce smoking in less addicted smokers. Fewer people smoke in Canada, and the ones who do are more addicted than the average smoker in the US. Because the graphics got the less addicted smokers to quit.

And really, is "per capita cigarettes smoked" a useful metric? When your goal is to save lives that would otherwise be lost to smoking, how many people are not smoking that otherwise would should be what you are measuring. Whether someone smokes a pack a day or a pack and a half a day, either way, they're likely going to die from their habit. But if you have 10% of the total population smoking a pack and a half a day vs 15% of all people smoking a pack day, I know which policy outcome I would prefer.

Hi. UK here. We already have this and have done for a good few years. Also tobacco products are not allowed to be on visible display in shops. There's an actual screen or sliding door between the customer and the product. You have to know what you want. You can't ask to look. Tobacco advertising is completely banned.

Slowly smoking rates are reducing but I haven't seen stats to suggest whether that's because less young are taking up the habit or many older folks are giving up.

I see a LOT of people vaping these days and, well, it's better than smoke.

I stopped a while back (unless I'm very drunk... that's the worst) but despite all the warnings the missus hasn't.

If I'm honest I think the biggest factor in the reduction of smoking in the UK is the insane price - all due to taxation.

(edit... typo. s'all)

Vaping is marginally better. Sure, there's less actual smoke, but we're starting to see bad lung reactions to the flavors used with them.

Smoking is #2 (annualized risk of death 1 in 100) Vaping #7 (annualized risk of death 1 in 10,000,000)

Dunno about you, but I wouldn't call 100,000-fold difference in risk "marginal".

Again, this is something we don't really know much about yet. There just hasn't been a whole lot of research on health effects of vaping, and most of the ingredients used are essentially unknown, as the product is barely regulated in any meaningful way.

So you just know that vaping is just as bad based on your feelings?

There have been numerous studies showing that what makes cigarettes cause cancer are chemicals like benzene, polonium-210[*], benzo(a)pyrene and nitrosamines. None of them are present in vapes.

Why not just let people smoke if they want to? Tax appropriately to cover health care costs, if your country has socialized medicine.

The problem with things that cause a physical dependency is that once you are addicted it is no longer a matter of free will. This is the reason why tobacco companies spent so much time actively trying to increase the addictiveness of cigarettes. It protects their income.

I started smoking at 14 years old. I tried to quit many times before I finally managed it in my late 40's I tried will power, patches, NHS inhaler type things. The problem is that alongside the addictive nature of nicotine there is a host of accompanying behaviours; The cigarette after dinner, the activity with your hands, every aspect of smoking becomes an ingrained habit. Quitting requires not only handling the cravings & behavioural aspects of dependency but also all the associated habits.

I finally managed to quit 6 or 7 years ago with the aid of vapourisers ( I also quit them after a year - I had no intention of swapping one dependency for another.) I vaped for a year, this allowed me to satisfy the nicotine dependency but break all the habits associated with smoking. After a year I went cold turkey on the vaping. I still had horrendous cravings & I wouldn't call it easy, but it was possible.

Since giving up I find it difficult to understand how it took me so long & am so happy about all the positives that have followed;

I used to get colds & flu, chest infections 4 - 6 times a year, for weeks on end - none since I quit

I used to get out of breath walking 300m to the local shops, now I can walk or cycle for miles

I was too weak to swim more than a few metres, now I can exercise (& I don't do so particularly regularly or excesively) I have pectorals & biceps & can do press-ups, and consequently I can swim.

And now the biggest benefit of all, and this may be too much information. but as a smoker I was struggling to get a proper erection, these days it is absolute Iron.

Smokers are addicts who have been conned into ruining their lives for the enrichment of others. They are, often unwitting, victims who will attempt all sorts of justifications to maintain their addiction, just as heroin or alchohol addicts do.

Keep in mind that regardless of the PR the tobacco companies spread in the west claiming to care about their customers & promising not to sell to kids & claims they are aiming for a smoke free future with their new vape like low temperature products, they are still marketing cigarettes to children in third world countries. I once saw a report 10 -15 years ago where they had teenagers giving away free packets to 10 years olds in africa whilst at teh time claiming in the UK that they would never market cigarettes to children.

1. No one smokes marijuana to the degree that people smoke cigarettes.

2. The actual number of harmful chemicals in marijuana are an order of magnitude less than those in cigarettes.

3. Marijuana isn't addictive. Cigarette tobacco has added nicotine to make it more addictive.

4. The incidence of marijuana-related health issues is so far below that of cigarette smokers as to be laughably ignorable (that's on a per capita basis, not just a head to head comparison).

5. Second hand marijuana smoke has never been proven to be a health hazard (a career hazard, but not one to health).

6. No one has ever died from a marijuana OD. People have died from an OD on tobacco. All reported cases of marijuana-related deaths show other factors involved that were either deliberately indulged in, or were unknown at the time. (Mixing drugs or preexisting health conditions.)

Yes, they're both plants that are "smoked", so there's an inherent base health risk from that activity alone. But HOW MUCH risk there is depends on the byproducts of combustion, the frequency of use and the amount of use each time. Marijuana isn't "safe", but compared to cigarettes, it's a shit-ton safer, and more medicinally useful.

Cigarettes literally have no social or medicinal benefit. The only KNOWN medicinal use for tobacco are topical or ingested for a variety of folk remedies (which are essentially moot today with safer and more effective medications). None of them involve burning it to inhale the smoke, and medicinal means rare, as needed use only - not a habitual use as it's done today.

I mean, I get that your stock in Phillip Morris isn't going to react well to this kind of thing, but seriously, I think your priorities are pretty fucked up to drag up that old false equivalency fallacy against marijuana.